Taking action: achieving gender equality and empowering women

156 Appendix 1
illiterate, while those with less than four years of schooling may have acquired
literacy skills by nonformal means. 1
In reviewing trends and projections for the target years, this report uses
the ratio of female to male gross enrollment rates in primary, secondary, and
tertiary education as well as the ratio of the female literacy rate to the male
literacy rate. The ratio of rates is used in order to analyze whether reductions
in gender disparity are being achieved through increases in the enrollment of
girls or through decreases in the enrollment of boys. This methodology is also
used by Abu-Ghaida and Klasen (2002) and UNIFEM (2003). The country
level data for these indicators can be found in tables A1.7–A1.10.
Methodology for projections
The predictions below are computed following a methodology similar to the
UNDP methodology described in Technical Note 2 of Human Development
Report 2002 (UNDP 2002).
The following formulas were used for primary, secondary, and tertiary
enrollment to predict values in 2005 and 2015:
For 2005: {[(Value in 2000 – value in 1990)/10] × 5} + value in 2000
For 2015: {[(Value in 2000 – value in 1990)/10] × 15} + value in 2000
The methodology used here differs somewhat from UNDP (2002). First,
it does not assume that a country that has achieved the target in 2000 will also
achieve the target in 2005 or 2015. Moreover, the countries that have values
between 0.9 and 0.99 in 2000 are not considered to be “on track” because their
rate of change between 1990 and 2000 may be such that they are trending
away from parity rather than toward parity.
This report uses slightly different terminology than UNDP (2002), which
uses “achieved,” “on track,” “lagging,” “far behind,” and “slipping back.” The
categories used here are: “reverse gap,” “parity,” “on track,” “falling behind,”
and “off track”:
• Reverse gap: A ratio of 1 or greater
• Parity: A ratio of 1
• On track: 0.90 to 0.99
• Falling behind: 0.70 to 0.89
• Off track: A ratio less than 0.70
It is important to note a number of concerns about the methodology. The
most important is the assumption used to calculate the rate of change. To
assume that this rate is linear, independent of a range of social, economic, and
political factors, is overly simple. A better approach would be to simulate the
effect of different contextual conditions based on data for each country. The
absence of such a simulation model, and the lack of data on women to use for